Critical Essay by Alden T. Vaughan and Virginia Mason Vaughan

In the excerpt below, the Vaughans discuss Caliban's physical features, his dramatic function, and the ambiguity of his characterization.

Caliban, a salvage and deformed slave.

The Tempest (names of the actors, 1623 Folio)

Caliban is the core of the play.

Frank Kermode (1954).

Caliban. In modern poetry he is a recurring symbol for the victimization of Third World peoples. In the theatre he can be anything the director imagines, from amphibian to punk rocker to black militant. Contemporary film shows him as the id: In Forbidden Planet he is Dr. Morbius's (Walter Pidgeon's) destructive impulse, ready to kill rather than be suppressed; in Paul Mazursky's adaptation Tempest, he (Raul Julia) is a libidinous Peeping Tom, ogling Miranda from...